


Salvation, Distilled

by De Orakle (Delphi)



Category: Harry Potter - Rowling
Genre: Drama, Established Relationship, M/M, Magic, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2001-01-01
Updated: 2001-01-01
Packaged: 2017-10-12 05:09:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 937
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/121131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Delphi/pseuds/De%20Orakle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I don't expect you will really understand the beauty of the softly simmering caldron with its shimmering fumes, the delicate power of liquids that creep through human veins, bewitching the mind, ensnaring the senses..." <br/>- Severus Snape, <i>Harry Potter & the Philosopher's Stone</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Salvation, Distilled

**Author's Note:**

> Exact date of publication unknown.

Just take a moment to admire, to anticipate...

Breathe.

How cool and dry these dungeon walls must be, standing untouched as they have for so very long. Even deep down where solid rock is as permeable as water, molecules of magic cluster together in haughty atoms between the sleepy bunches of carbon and bauxite, loathing to even brush the ancient granite whose thoughts move with the speed of a continental drift and whose powers are its own.

Touch, then, is not something to be taken lightly. It requires the weight of stone.

 _"Severus..."_

And the smell...

There is the smell of magic, like the grape soda-pop scent of faie-grown kudzu. There is dust that tickles the nose and sickly-sweet nightshade that tickles the blood. The little shoots of the latter are young and tender, and they yield like butter under the knife. With proper preparation, these slips are as lethal as their berries, and they masquerade as fresh green morsels to tempt the palate.

But there is no real need for the deception, now is there. Death may wrap itself in the flavour of onions, or in a pretty, stuttering body, but eventually it must be...tasted.

Tip of the tongue to fingertip—wet metal and salt. This is a secret ritual, to take in each of the parts and let them brew inside the body into the whole. The stomach as cauldron...and the spit and blood and acid make it that much more potent.

Poison. The things that man will take willingly into his body.

Consider the alternative.

Swallow.

Candles are lit. Their solemn flames stand at attention from wick to crown in the still, still room. Mere ambience, in respect for the alchemists of ages past who never dreamed of fire's capable and bastard sons: fluorescent lighting and the microwave oven.

Smile...at the little pewter melting pots and the polished crystal phials, holiday gifts and gracious indulgences. The set of scales is delicate and perfectly weighted with sliver-thin bases of silver. It's all quite decadent, yes, but there has always been a voyeuristic angle to this mating of art and science. And what is any magic but the spawn of that unlikely union?

Smile again, because no one is here to see.

Ritual continues, as ritual must. Encumbering cloth is rolled away from hands and forearms. Knuckles are cracked to limberness. Lips are licked.

The half-filled cauldron reflects the very pale palm of a hand growing warm and wet with condensation and perspiration.

Perfect.

Perfection is, after all, as necessary an ingredient as serpent's milk. And the price of perfection is the demand for it.

 _"Severus..."_

Watch—

There is that...

suspended...

...fall.

Bits of crushed, sliced, drained ingredients that were once part of something living and will be again. Colours, black and green, spiral to the cauldron's depths. The waters churn gently as the Foxlick and Witch Rose react with one another; settle as the essence of manticore liver overpowers them both. As always, blood swirls to its own rhythm, holding to the memory of veins and arteries traveled and life sustained.

And...

Wait for it...

Wait for it...

There.

The cauldron sings out in the voice of a drowning man.

Appropriately, a loose scrap of Shakespeare flutters into mind. Macbeth's three witches...shocking generations of young wizards to laughter with the sheer audacity with which they trod the boards of stereotype. Spouting prophecy in twisted riddles, brewing scavenger's soup skyclad—

And that last is almost rather...tempting, isn't it? And it's not the first time the notion has tried to take root. The temperature rises—what would it feel like to strip off the robe and shirt and let the steam press and envelop bare skin like a lover's body? Would each pop of bubbling water feel like a kiss—or a bite?

Touching gently...beneath wool and cotton. Short hairs rise along the path of cool fingertips and a warm stomach.

 _"...it's late..."_

Eyes closed...it's all right to smile softly, with no one here to laugh. To take a breath full of complex scents and simple magic. To go very still.

And there is that moment, which a student must fretfully search for with eyes glued to the thaumometer, but which a master may pinpoint by merely closing his eyes and opening his hand...

There.

//Auctor. Ardet...ore...iratus. Gratiae.//

Words...oh, the will and the wonder of them.

There is the movement of lips and tongue, kissing the air with a skill bred of familiarity.

A flash—

the taste of wet smoke—

—the glint of silver hair in the periphery.

A shimmer of colour falls off the furthest end of the spectrum into thin air, shaped like Latin.

Does anyone else see the words that slip from their lips into law? How fleeting and...beautiful they are, and selfishness aside, what a pity it would be if only one person could admire them. But of course, Albus...Albus must see them, to give and take pleasure in his words as he does.

Breathe out slowly. Catch a breath in a cupped hand.

And to take the first mouthful that is a potions master's due—

 _"...come to bed?"_

The voice apparates through stone and time, ending its journey as low words and warm breath. Much too innocent to be anything but knowing.

Eyes shut, it's almost...there. A kiss pressed softly above the collar.

There are layers upon layers of meanings in that single sentence, and yet they are all the same.

And perhaps...

Perhaps salvation will keep until morning.

For now...

Just take a moment to admire...to anticipate.


End file.
